An article by Rick Gladstone runs under the headline "Iran Finding Ways to Evade Sanctions, Treasury Department Warns." The article has at least two problems.

First, there's a reference to "Steve H. Hanke, a Johns Hopkins University economics professor and senior fellow at the Cato Institute, a conservative Washington research group, who has been following Iran's case, said the official inflation rate reflected what he called the Central Bank's 'habit of failing to release useful economic data, and what it does release often has what I would describe as an 'Alice in Wonderland' quality.'"

On his blog at the Council on Foreign Relations, Elliott Abrams does a wonderful job of debunking a poll that the New York Times covered unskeptically the other day in an article by Rick Gladstone headlined "Majority of Americans Favor Trade With Cuba, Poll Finds."

The Times article described the organization that commissioned the poll, the Atlantic Council, as "a prominent Washington research organization." Mr. Abrams provides some information the Times did not: "the Atlantic Council has a strong position against the embargo on Cuba." Neither article discloses that the Atlantic Council is partially funded by foreign governments that include Bahrain, Kazakhstan, Qatar, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, information that came out during the process of confirming Secretary of Defense Hagel.

On his blog at the Council on Foreign Relations, Elliott Abrams does a wonderful job of debunking a poll that the New York Times covered unskeptically the other day in an article by Rick Gladstone headlined "Majority of Americans Favor Trade With Cuba, Poll Finds."

The Times article described the organization that commissioned the poll, the Atlantic Council, as "a prominent Washington research organization." Mr. Abrams provides some information the Times did not: "the Atlantic Council has a strong position against the embargo on Cuba." Neither article discloses that the Atlantic Council is partially funded by foreign governments that include Bahrain, Kazakhstan, Qatar, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates, information that came out during the process of confirming Secretary of Defense Hagel.

An article by Rick Gladstone runs under the headline "Iran Finding Ways to Evade Sanctions, Treasury Department Warns." The article has at least two problems.

First, there's a reference to "Steve H. Hanke, a Johns Hopkins University economics professor and senior fellow at the Cato Institute, a conservative Washington research group, who has been following Iran's case, said the official inflation rate reflected what he called the Central Bank's 'habit of failing to release useful economic data, and what it does release often has what I would describe as an 'Alice in Wonderland' quality.'"